Sr. Security Engineer, Leo Security

Amazon; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 183,000 - 248,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Restricted stock units (RSUs)

401(k) matching

Paid time off

Job summary

Amazon Leo is a pioneering satellite security program. This role analyzes security events, isolates immediate fixes, and identifies long-term trends to reduce risk across the Leo organization.

You will lead Find and Fix missions, drive cross‑team actions, and own end‑to‑end security initiatives. A Bachelor’s in CS and 5+ years in security, plus cloud experience, are required; U.S. citizenship for GovCloud access.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field.
• 5+ years in application security frameworks, IA controls, incident response and related areas.
• 3+ years of cloud-based solution, system and network experience.
• 5+ years driving cross-organisational security initiatives.
• 2+ years applying AI to automate security.
• U.S. citizenship required for AWS GovCloud access.

Responsibilities

• Analyse security events across Amazon Leo and distinguish immediate fixes from systemic trends.
• Prioritise work by threat severity and business impact to deliver timely improvements.
• Drive immediate fixes by routing tasks to the right teams and ensuring completion.
• Lead time-boxed Find and Fix missions to clarify emerging trends.
• Own end-to-end security initiatives that reduce risk across the organisation.
• Serve as tier-3 escalation during incidents and advocate for new detection tools.

Skills

Security leadership

Threat hunting

Incident response

Cloud security

AI for security

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science

Job description

Amazon Leo is an initiative to launch a constellation of Low Earth Orbit satellites that will provide low‑latency, high‑speed broadband network connectivity to unserved and underserved communities around the world.

We are a specialised security team that sits inside a global satellite communications business. Our job is to make sure security lessons become permanent: when a security event happens we find the root cause, close the immediate gap and build the mechanism that keeps it closed. We watch across the whole environment, spot the trends others are too busy to chase and turn them into initiatives that measurably reduce risk.

We work shoulder to shoulder with the builder teams designing, launching and operating the product, and we partner closely with incident response, detection and enterprise security functions. Over the coming years our focus is shifting further upstream: getting ahead of incidents through proactive posture improvement, hunting for gaps before they are exploited, and investing in automation so security scales with the business rather than against it. If you want your work to protect customers of a system being built at a scale few companies attempt you will find purpose here.

Export Control Requirement

Due to applicable export control laws and regulations candidates must be a U.S. citizen or national.

Key job responsibilities

• You will analyse the security events observed across Amazon Leo, separating each one into the immediate fixes it demands and the longer‑term, systemic trends it reveals across the organisation.
• You will prioritise this work by the severity and business impact of the threat to Leo, concentrating your effort on the most serious security issues and making sound risk‑based trade‑offs to deliver against them on time.
• You will drive immediate fixes to closure by identifying the right team or individual to own each task, and by creating the mechanisms needed to ensure security outcomes are prioritised and tracked to completion across teams with competing priorities.
• You will lead time‑boxed Find and Fix missions to investigate and clarify emerging security trends, turning early and ambiguous signals into a validated understanding of the underlying problem.
• You will own security initiatives end‑to‑end that resolve the root cause of systemic trends, favouring centralised, secure‑by‑default controls that measurably and durably reduce risk across the organisation.
• You will serve as tier‑3 escalation support during security incidents, advise partner teams on difficult security decisions, and advocate for new detection mechanisms and testing tools that reduce security operations cost over time.

A day in the life

In this highly dynamic role you will decide where your time investments deliver the most security value, balancing proactive posture‑improvement work against reactive support when security events arise. Teams across the business will reach out for guidance on a wide variety of security problems and you can anticipate questions like “What’s the right way to handle authentication tokens in service‑to‑service communications?” “We’re planning a confidential new product launch and need to define its security requirements?” “We just had a security event and need to run a root cause analysis to identify and correct what produced it.”

When you’re not responding to builder teams you will evaluate overall security posture across the organisation to surface architectural defects, hunt for gaps before they become incidents and propose new security initiatives that correct systemic problems. Through this blend of consultation, investigation and long‑term mechanism building you will help maintain a high bar for customer security.

About the team

Why Amazon Security? At Amazon, security is central to maintaining customer trust and delivering delightful customer experiences. Our organisation is responsible for creating and maintaining a high bar for security across all of Amazon’s products and services. We offer talented security professionals the chance to accelerate their careers with opportunities to build experience in a wide variety of areas including cloud, devices, retail, entertainment, healthcare, operations and physical stores.

Training & Career Growth We’re continuously raising our performance bar as we strive to become Earth’s Best Employer. That’s why you’ll find endless knowledge‑sharing, training and other career‑advancing resources here to help you develop into a better‑rounded professional.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related field
• 5+ years of any combination of the following: application security frameworks, identity and access controls, incident response, mobile security, cloud computing and security, AI security, threat intelligence and penetration testing experience
• 3+ years of cloud‑based solution (AWS or equivalent), system, network and operating system experience
• 5+ years of driving cross‑organisational security initiatives.
• 2+ years experience using AI to automate security.
• This position requires U.S. citizenship in order to access AWS GovCloud

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience working in identifying security issues and risks and developing mitigation plans
• Experience in threat hunting, detection engineering or product/application security, including moving from a security hypothesis to a validated detection, control or remediation within a time‑boxed engagement
• Experience owning security remediation initiatives end‑to‑end, including scoping the problem, driving cross‑team execution without direct authority and measuring the resulting outcome

Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability or other legally protected status.

Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgement, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism and safeguard business operations and the Company’s reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you’re applying in isn’t listed please contact your Recruiting Partner.

The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign‑on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits.

USA, CA, San Francisco - 183,000.00 - 247,600.00 USD annually